Jan. 17, 2013 — Dogs and
wolves are genetically so similar, it's been difficult for biologists to
understand why wolves remain fiercely wild, while dogs can gladly
become "man's best friend." Now, doctoral research by evolutionary
biologist Kathryn Lord at the University of Massachusetts Amherst
suggests the different behaviors are related to the animals' earliest
sensory experiences and the critical period of socialization. Details
appear in the current issue of Ethology.

Until now, little was known about sensory development in wolf pups,
and assumptions were usually extrapolated from what is known for dogs,
Lord explains. This would be reasonable, except scientists already know
there are significant differences in early development between wolf and
dog pups, chief among them timing of the ability to walk, she adds.

To address this knowledge gap, she studied responses of seven wolf
pups and 43 dogs to both familiar and new smells, sounds and visual
stimuli, tested them weekly, and found they did develop their senses at
the same time. But her study also revealed new information about how the
two subspecies of Canis lupus experience their environment
during a four-week developmental window called the critical period of
socialization, and the new facts may significantly change understanding
of wolf and dog development.

When the socialization window is open, wolf and dog pups begin
walking and exploring without fear and will retain familiarity
throughout their lives with those things they contact. Domestic dogs can
be introduced to humans, horses and even cats at this stage and be
comfortable with them forever. But as the period progresses, fear
increases and after the window closes, new sights, sounds and smells
will elicit a fear response.

Through observations, Lord confirmed that both wolf pups and dogs
develop the sense of smell at age two weeks, hearing at four weeks and
vision by age six weeks on average. However, these two subspecies enter
the critical period of socialization at different ages. Dogs begin the
period at four weeks, while wolves begin at two weeks. Therefore, how
each subspecies experiences the world during that all-important month is
extremely different, and likely leads to different developmental paths,
she says.

Lord reports for the first time that wolf pups are still blind and
deaf when they begin to walk and explore their environment at age two
weeks. "No one knew this about wolves, that when they begin exploring
they're blind and deaf and rely primarily on smell at this stage, so
this is very exciting," she notes.
She adds, "When wolf pups first start to hear, they are frightened of
the new sounds initially, and when they first start to see they are
also initially afraid of new visual stimuli. As each sense engages, wolf
pups experience a new round of sensory shocks that dog puppies do not."

Meanwhile, dog pups only begin to explore and walk after all three
senses, smell, hearing and sight, are functioning. Overall, "It's quite
startling how different dogs and wolves are from each other at that
early age, given how close they are genetically. A litter of dog puppies
at two weeks are just basically little puddles, unable to get up or
walk around. But wolf pups are exploring actively, walking strongly with
good coordination and starting to be able to climb up little steps and
hills."

These significant, development-related differences in dog and wolf
pups' experiences put them on distinctly different trajectories in
relation to the ability to form interspecies social attachments, notably
with humans, Lord says. This new information has implications for
managing wild and captive wolf populations, she says.

Her experiments analyzed the behavior of three groups of young
animals: 11 wolves from three litters and 43 dogs total. Of the dogs, 33
border collies and German shepherds were raised by their mothers and a
control group of 10 German shepherd pups were hand-raised, meaning a
human was introduced soon after birth.

At the gene level, she adds, "the difference may not be in the gene
itself, but in when the gene is turned on. The data help to explain why,
if you want to socialize a dog with a human or a horse, all you need is
90 minutes to introduce them between the ages of four and eight weeks.
After that, a dog will not be afraid of humans or whatever else you
introduced. Of course, to build a real relationship takes more time. But
with a wolf pup, achieving even close to the same fear reduction
requires 24-hour contact starting before age three weeks, and even then
you won't get the same attachment or lack of fear."

The film offers an abbreviated history of the relationship between wolves and people—told from the wolf’s perspective—from a time when they coexisted to an era in which people began to fear and exterminate the wolves.

The return of wolves to the northern Rocky Mountains has been called one of America’s greatest conservation stories. But wolves are facing new attacks by members of Congress who are gunning to remove Endangered Species Act protections before the species has recovered.

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Inescapably, the realization was being borne in upon my preconditioned mind that the centuries-old and universally accepted human concept of wolf character was a palpable lie... From this hour onward, I would go open-minded into the lupine world and learn to see and know the wolves, not for what they were supposed to be, but for what they actually were.

-Farley Mowat, Never Cry Wolf

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“If you look into the eyes of a wild wolf, there is something there more powerful than many humans can accept.” – Suzanne Stone